EU Projects

Environment and Health in Transport

Ongoing projects

BuyZET aims to understand and optimise the impact of public procurement activities on transport patterns in cities – and to find innovative and sustainable delivery solutions for goods and services. The BuyZET project is a partnership of cities aiming to achieve zero emission urban delivery of goods and services, by understanding the transportation footprint of procurement activities and developing innovative procurement plans.

The SUNRISE project (Sustainable Urban Neighbourhoods – Research and Implementation Support in Europe) aims at developing new tools to facilitate collaborative ways to address mobility challenges at the neighbourhood level. Six action neighbourhoods will be equipped and empowered to broaden the range of options for the inhabitants, beyond conventional mobility and transport solutions.

FLOW is a CIVITAS Horizon 2020 project that is developing a multimodal analysis methodology to assess the impact of walking and cycling measures on transport network performance and congestion. FLOW’s ideas are being tested in its partner cities of Budapest, Dublin, Gdynia, Lisbon, Munich and Sofia. The project runs from May 2015 to April 2018.

By exposing over 80 Electric Freight Vehicles (EFVs) to the day to day rigours of the urban logistics environment, FREVUE aims to prove that the current generation of electric vans and trucks can offer a viable alternative to diesel vehicles, particularly when combined with state of the art urban logistics applications, innovative logistics management software, and with well-designed (local) policy.

REFORM supports the implementation and deployment of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) as an instrument for shifting mobility towards low-carbon patterns. In the framework of the REFORM project, through regional and interregional learning exchanges, REFORM will trigger the SUMP development process and amplify the SUMP adoption rate by local cities in four European regions: Central Macedonia (Greece), Emilia-Romagna (Italy), Parkstad Limburg (the Netherlands) & Greater Manchester (United-Kingdom)

TRACE aims to increase and optimise the use of ICT tracking services for cycling and walking in cities. The TRACE project will assess the potential of movement tracking services to better plan and promote walking and cycling in cities, and will develop innovative tracking tools that will encourage the take up of walking and cycling measures.

The Strengthening European Transport Research and Innovation Strategies project (SETRIS) is a project funded under the European Union (EU)’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation Programme, specifically targeted at strengthening the research and innovation strategies of the transport industries in Europe. SETRIS assists the 5 European Technological Platforms (ETPs) to define their common research steps for strategy and programmes in alignment.

Polis manages the Sustainable Urban Mobility activities within the EIP-SCC Market Place. The European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities (EIP-SCC) is an initiative supported by the European Commission bringing together cities, industry, SMEs, banks, research and other smart city actors. The EIP-SCC Market Place has been designed for those who are active in the challenging area of Smart Cities and willing to know more about ongoing and foreseen activities throughout Europe. The Market Place includes two Sustainable Urban Mobility Initiatives: Smart Mobility Services and EV4SCC looking into electromobility.

PASTA focuses on the systematic promotion and facilitation of active travel (i.e. walking, cycling, and public transport use) as an innovative approach to insert physical activity into individuals’ everyday lives. A longitudinal study will be conducted across 7 cities to evaluate the ongoing active travel initiatives to better understand correlates of active travel and in particular their effects on overall physical activity, injury risk and exposure to air pollution. Based on the study findings, existing research, and the World Health Organisation’s Health Economic Assessment Tool for walking and cycling (HEAT) an improved tool for health impact assessment of active travel will be developed.

The CLEAN VEHICLE PORTAL has been set up to implement the Directive on the Promotion of Clean and Energy Efficient Road Transport Vehicles (DIRECTIVE 2009/33/EC). It assists contracting authorities to take into account lifetime energy and environmental impact of road transport vehicles during procurement.

The European Road Transport Research Advisory Committee (ERTRAC) develops a common vision for European transport. It also coordinates the implementation of the results found by the research in order to improve competitiveness.

Completed projects

CATCH (Carbon Aware Travel CHoice) is developing an open knowledge platform to support primarily decision-makers in cities. The CATCH knowledge platform aims to empower local authorities in creating carbon-friendly mobility.

CITEAIR II (Common Information on European Air) has developed indicators to compare air quality across cities, and good practice guidance on air quality forecasting, integrating CO² emissions into air pollutant emissions inventories.

CITYMOVE is developing an innovative vehicle for urban freight distribution allowing less emissions, more safety for drivers and vulnerable road users, more flexibility and more efficiency for freight operators.

The CIVITAS CATALIST project has the aim to validate, exploit and disseminate the results of the CIVITAS Initiative and, more importantly, of stimulating new cities in the adoption of sustainable, clean and energy efficient urban transport.

NICHES+ builds further on the NICHES project. Its mission is to promote innovative measures for making urban transport more efficient and sustainable and to move them from their current ‘niche’ position into a mainstream urban transport application.

CIVITAS VANGUARD is a 54-month grant-based project of the European Commission’s. It is a support action for the coordination and dissemination of CIVITAS Plus, the current phase of the CIVITAS Initiative, and as such serves the CIVITAS Plus collaborative projects (CPs) and the CIVITAS Initiative itself.

PRESTO is about competence building in cycling policies. The project offered a set of tools for technicians to create cycle friendly urban environments, to implement sound cycling plans and to start up targeted promotion campaigns. PRESTO focused on infrastructure, promotion and pedelecs (pedal-assisted electric bikes).

BYPAD is an independent assessment tool by experts of cycling in cities and regions.

Within Common Information To European Air (CITEAIR) the first European Common Air Quality Index (CAQI) has been developed and is used to harmonize the air quality database displayed on a Common Operational Webpage (COW). The COW provides a platform to compare near-real time air quality information.

The programme “Measures to Influence Transport Demand to Achieve Sustainability” (MIDAS) encourages a shift to more sustainable transport devices. It may be done through incentive actions to lower the demand for private motorised transports systems.

CONDUITS developed key performance indicators to assist European municipalities in taking decisions on ITS deployment and to facilitate the exchange of good ITS practice among cities. The project performed a review of ITS in cities today, identified the ITS of tomorrow from a city perspective and reviewed technological developments.

CONDUITS continues for one year beyond its project life from mid 2011 to mid 2012.

ECOSTARS kicked off in June 2011 and will set up seven fleet recognition schemes until 2014. Each ECOSTARS scheme will rate vehicles and operating practices using star rating criteria, to recognise levels of environmental and energy savings performance. Operators will then receive tailor-made support to ensure the fleet is running as efficiently and economically as possible, to help them progress to higher ratings within the scheme.

CHAMP brings together six champion cities (Edinburgh, Örebro, Burgos, Groningen, Bolzano and Ljubljana) in the field of cycling policy. Despite their high number of cyclists, these cities hope to further increase the cycling share of the modal split by sharing experiences and good practices. CHAMP will allow for the cities to learn from each other and for the dissemination of good practices in the cycling field.

The EC's Sustainable Urban Mobility campaign is a three-year initiative aiming to support sustainable urban mobility campaigners in 31 countries. An award fund supports actions at the local, regional and/or national, or even EU level. The campaign includes an award scheme for European cities based on their sustainable urban mobility plans (SUMPs).

Smartfusion a public-private partnership aimed to evaluate the technical and logistical feasibility of introducing fully electric vehicles and the second generation of hybrid truck technology in last mile operations and the related urban/inter-urban shipment processes. The project brought together technology providers and supply chain providers, and was build upon existing urban freight development strategies from three demonstration city-regions: Berlin, New Castle upon Tyne and the Lombardy Region.

MOLECULES (“Mobility based on electric connected vehicles in urban and interurban smart, clean, environments) was a demonstration project with three large scale pilots in Barcelona, Berlin and Greater Paris aiming to use ICT services to help achieve a consistent, integrated uptake of Smart Connected Electromobility in cities. The project tried to enhance the user experience by offering the public alternative electro-mobility modes of transportation supported by ICT technologies (e-bikes, e-cars and e-motorbikes).

ICT-Emissions developed a novel methodology to evaluate the impact of ICT-related measures on mobility, vehicle energy consumption and CO2 emissions at the local scale. An integrated methodology to quantify CO2 emissions on road transport was tested and validated in several large European cities such as Turin, Madrid and Rome.

BESTFACT (Best Practice Factory for Freight Transport) will develop, disseminate and enhance the utilisation of Best Practices and innovation in freight transport within three thematic clusters: Urban Freight, Green logistics & co-modality, and eFreight. The project will present new descriptions of European Best Practice cases, detailed Best Practice surveys, analyses of innovative policy schemes and will support the implementation of Best Practice actions. Within its thematic workshops and Conferences, BESTFACT will bring stakeholders together creating synergies within different European initiatives.

DELIVER (Design of Electric LIght Vans for Environment-impact Reduction) aims, as part of the European Green Cars Initiative, to explore urban light commercial vehicle (LCV) concepts intended for larger scale production. It will execute a broad scope conceptual design study which will start by establishing initial design specifications and continue to a detailed prototype-based and virtual performance assessment, as well as to a running concept demonstrator vehicle.

CH4LLENGE – The goal of CH4LLENGE is to actively facilitate the take-up of Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) in European cities, and to establish a cross- initiative dialogue on overcoming SUMP challenges. The project will support 30 European cities at different stages of working with SUMP. The CH4LLENGE consortium will develop “challenge kits” and will set-up an e-learning platform. More information about CH4LLENGE will soon be available at the project’s webpage.

PTP-Cycle is a project using Personalised Travel Planning (PTP) methods to promote a shift from private motor vehicle use towards cycling, walking and public transport. PTP provides tailored information directly to the individual through a one to one discussion with a PTP Adviser. PTP-Cycle aims to offer a holistic approach to assist cities, businessesand universities in developing their PTP processes.

The European project STARS (Sustainable Travel Accreditation and Recognition for Schools) gathers nine implementation partners around one common goal: to increase the number of pupils cycling to and from school, who would previously have been escorted by car.

VRUITS helps to improve safety and mobility of vulnerable road users (VRUs) through ITS applications. The project takes a VRU-centric approach to come to recommendations for suitable ITS applications, leading ot a full integration of the VRUs in the traffic system.

SWITCH uses information and communication technologies (ICT), and personalised travel planning advice supported by strong health arguments to encourage people in a period of life change to switch from short car journeys to more walking and cycling. The project supports cities in developing and implementing local campaigns to reduce motorised traffic and CO2 levels.

CIVITAS CAPITAL. A three year project aiming to contribute significantly to the goals of the EU's Transport White Paper by capitalising systematically on the results of CIVITAS and creating an effective "value chain" for urban mobility innovation. CAPITAL will initiate and support a mainstreaming process of CIVITIAS principles based on a strengthened community of stakeholders.

Traffic Efficiency and Mobility

Ongoing projects

CoEXist (May 2017 – April 2020) aims to prepare for the transition phase during which automated and conventional vehicles will co-exist on urban roads. Through a cross-disciplinary approach and the engagement of relevant stakeholders, CoEXist is developing an automation-ready framework for road authorities and is developing traffic simulation tools. The tools developed by CoEXist will be tested by road authorities in four cities with different urban structures and traffic compositions: Helmond (NL), Milton Keynes (UK), Gothenburg (SE) and Stuttgart (DE), in order to assess the “automation-readiness” of their locally-designed use cases.

By exposing over 80 Electric Freight Vehicles (EFVs) to the day to day rigours of the urban logistics environment, FREVUE aims to prove that the current generation of electric vans and trucks can offer a viable alternative to diesel vehicles, particularly when combined with state of the art urban logistics applications, innovative logistics management software, and with well-designed (local) policy.

ZeEUS, the Zero Emission Urban Bus System, aims to be the main EU activity to extend the fully-electric solution to the core part of the urban bus network. It fits within the context of the European Commission’s objective to create a competitive and sustainable transport system. To achieve its mission, ZeEUS is testing innovative electric bus technologies with different charging infrastructure solutions in ten demonstration sites across Europe.

ELIPTIC aims to develop new concepts and business cases in order to optimise existing electric public transport infrastructure and rolling stock, saving both money and energy. The project strengthens the role of electric public transport, leading to reduced fossil fuel consumption and improved air quality.

CODECS (COoperative ITSDEploymentCoordinationSupport) is a 3-year Coordination and Support Action addressing the deployment of cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems and Services (C-ITS). CODECS is providing a platform for C-ITS stakeholders to share information and lessons learned from initial deployment. CODECS is also making an inventory of the C-ITS status and implementation approaches (technologies, specifications and functions), roles and responsibilities of different stakeholders as well as issues for strategic decision making.

MAVEN (Managing Automated Vehicles Enhances Network) aims to provide solutions for managing automated vehicles in an urban environment (with signalised intersections and mixed traffic). It will develop algorithms for organising the flow of infrastructure-assisted automated vehicles, and structuring the negotiation processes between vehicles and the infrastructure. The project expects to cover a wide range of subjects relevant to the city authority, including the role of road side equipment (eg, traffic lights); interaction between the infrastructure and automated vehicle in terms of functions such as speed advisory, platooning or lane change advisory; and, the impact on vulnerable road users (pedestrians and cyclists), among others.

TRACE aims to increase and optimise the use of ICT tracking services for cycling and walking in cities. The TRACE project will assess the potential of movement tracking services to better plan and promote walking and cycling in cities, and will develop innovative tracking tools that will encourage the take up of walking and cycling measures.

NOVELOG (New cooperative business models and guidance for sustainable city logistics) aims to enable the knowledge and understanding of freight distribution and service trips, by providing guidance for implementing effective and sustainable policies and measures, and to formulate detailed business plans of Urban Freight Transport measures, in a multi-stakeholder partnership. NOVELOG will reach out to all the key players, both public and private, to ensure a stakeholder-oriented and coordinated approach to city logistics.

CITYLAB aims to improve the understanding of the impacts freight and service trips have in our urban areas. Innovative urban freight management solutions are being tested and evaluated in Amsterdam, Brussels, London, Oslo, Paris, Rome and Southampton, with a view to positively influencing business profitability and contributing to increased efficiency and sustainability. The core of CITYLAB is to use cities as ‘living laboratories’ - dynamic, real-world test environments where different public and private freight transport measures can be evaluated, adapted and improved in a cyclical way.

The Strengthening European Transport Research and Innovation Strategies project (SETRIS) is a project funded under the European Union (EU)’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation Programme, specifically targeted at strengthening the research and innovation strategies of the transport industries in Europe. SETRIS assists the 5 European Technological Platforms (ETPs) to define their common research steps for strategy and programmes in alignment.

Polis manages the Sustainable Urban Mobility activities within the EIP-SCC Market Place. The European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities (EIP-SCC) is an initiative supported by the European Commission bringing together cities, industry, SMEs, banks, research and other smart city actors. The EIP-SCC Market Place has been designed for those who are active in the challenging area of Smart Cities and willing to know more about ongoing and foreseen activities throughout Europe. The Market Place includes two Sustainable Urban Mobility Initiatives: Smart Mobility Services and EV4SCC looking into electromobility.

The European Road Transport Research Advisory Committee (ERTRAC) develops a common vision for European transport. It also coordinates the implementation of the results found by the research in order to improve competitiveness.

Completed projects

The CIVITAS CATALIST project has the aim to validate, exploit and disseminate the results of the CIVITAS Initiative and, more importantly, of stimulating new cities in the adoption of sustainable, clean and energy efficient urban transport.

NICHES+ builds further on the NICHES project. Its mission is to promote innovative measures for making urban transport more efficient and sustainable and to move them from their current ‘niche’ position into a mainstream urban transport application.

CIVITAS VANGUARD is a 54-month grant-based project of the European Commission’s. It is a support action for the coordination and dissemination of CIVITAS Plus, the current phase of the CIVITAS Initiative, and as such serves the CIVITAS Plus collaborative projects (CPs) and the CIVITAS Initiative itself.

CITYMOBIL investigates, validates and demonstrates the capabilities of new mobility solutions in different European cities. It develops advanced concepts for innovative autonomous and automated road vehicles for passengers and goods.

COCITIES looks into the dynamic adaptation of traffic management measures according to policy goals. It will provide one standard interface between city traffic management information and the transport information service providers.

CONDUITS developed key performance indicators to assist European municipalities in taking decisions on ITS deployment and to facilitate the exchange of good ITS practice among cities. The project performed a review of ITS in cities today, identified the ITS of tomorrow from a city perspective and reviewed technological developments.

CONDUITS continues for one year beyond its project life from mid 2011 to mid 2012.

Field Operational Tests or FOTs are large-scale test programmes of ICT solutions for transport. This project provides a reference networking platform that gathers national, European and international ITS Field Operational Test information.

The SMARTFREIGHT project researches and demonstrates the integration of urban traffic management systems and freight and logistics systems by building on existing cooperative technologies, with the goal of increasing the efficiency and reducing the environmental impact of urban freight delivery.

STADIUM aims to improve the performance of transport services and systems made available for large events hosted by big cities. The project demonstrates ITS applications at three events: the South Africa World Cup (2010), the India Commonwealth Games (2010) and the London Olympics (2012).

CVIS (Cooperative Vehicle-infrastructure System) is a project aimed to create a unified technical solution allowing all vehicles and infrastructure elements to communicate with each other in a continuous and transparent way using a variety of media and with enhanced localisation. This would enable a wide range of potential cooperative services to run on an open application framework in the vehicle and roadside equipment.

OPTIPARK’s mission is to contribute to enhanced urban mobility and a more rationale use of urban space by optimising urban parking resources, deploying innovative parking services and combining them with business activities that generate mobility demands.

Smartfusion a public-private partnership aimed to evaluate the technical and logistical feasibility of introducing fully electric vehicles and the second generation of hybrid truck technology in last mile operations and the related urban/inter-urban shipment processes. The project brought together technology providers and supply chain providers, and was build upon existing urban freight development strategies from three demonstration city-regions: Berlin, New Castle upon Tyne and the Lombardy Region.

The POLITE (Policy Learning in Information Technologies for Public Transport Enhancement) project aims to provide public administrations with knowledge & skills concerning ICT tools and solutions, and to contribute to the process of deployment of ITS in the EU. POLITE promotes co-modality, i.e. the efficient use of different modes of transport on their own and in combinations, resulting in an optimal use of transport resources.

POSSE (Promoting Open Standards and Specifications in Europe) encourages the use of ITS for sustainable urban policies and supports the development of Europe-wide open ITS specifications and standards.

BESTFACT (Best Practice Factory for Freight Transport) will develop, disseminate and enhance the utilisation of Best Practices and innovation in freight transport within three thematic clusters: Urban Freight, Green logistics & co-modality, and eFreight. The project will present new descriptions of European Best Practice cases, detailed Best Practice surveys, analyses of innovative policy schemes and will support the implementation of Best Practice actions. Within its thematic workshops and Conferences, BESTFACT will bring stakeholders together creating synergies within different European initiatives.

MyWay will investigate, develop and validate an integrated platform, the European Smart Mobility Resource Manager, including cloud-based services and facilities to support community supplied information collection and processing. MyWay aims to develop a journey planner with mobile user services that facilitates personalised seamless integration of public and private transport modes into a single trip and make travelling around the city effortless, swift and pleasurable.

NODES, New Tools for Design and Operation of Urban Transport Interchanges is a three-year research European project, focusing on the efficient integration of public transport services. It will build a toolbox to support European cities in the design and operation of new or upgraded interchanges, as a way to provide greater support, services and satisfaction to the travelers and users.

CIVITAS CAPITAL. A three year project aiming to contribute significantly to the goals of the EU's Transport White Paper by capitalising systematically on the results of CIVITAS and creating an effective "value chain" for urban mobility innovation. CAPITAL will initiate and support a mainstreaming process of CIVITIAS principles based on a strengthened community of stakeholders.

CityMobil2 is setting up a pilot platform for automated road transport systems, which are implemented in several urban environments across Europe. Automated transport systems are made up of vehicles operating without a driver in collective mode. They are deemed to play a useful role in the transport mix as they can supply a good transport service (individual or collective) in areas of low or dispersed demand complementing the main public transport network.

CIMEC is a city-focused project which will explore the role cooperative ITS systems (C-ITS) can play to support city authorities, both in managing their transport networks and the delivery of other transport-linked services. It will reach out to key stakeholder groups (both public and private) to ensure a smooth and cost-effective deployment of C-ITS in cities around Europe.

Transport Safety and Security

Ongoing projects

ISAAC develops evidence-based recommendations to achieve modal shift in favour of walking and cycling - without compromising road safety, social security and comfort. ISAAC develops tools that help administrations to identify the most effective and appropriate road safety measures for their city: an interactive checklist and guidelines.

The Strengthening European Transport Research and Innovation Strategies project (SETRIS) is a project funded under the European Union (EU)’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation Programme, specifically targeted at strengthening the research and innovation strategies of the transport industries in Europe. SETRIS assists the 5 European Technological Platforms (ETPs) to define their common research steps for strategy and programmes in alignment.

Polis manages the Sustainable Urban Mobility activities within the EIP-SCC Market Place. The European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities (EIP-SCC) is an initiative supported by the European Commission bringing together cities, industry, SMEs, banks, research and other smart city actors. The EIP-SCC Market Place has been designed for those who are active in the challenging area of Smart Cities and willing to know more about ongoing and foreseen activities throughout Europe. The Market Place includes two Sustainable Urban Mobility Initiatives: Smart Mobility Services and EV4SCC looking into electromobility.

The European Road Transport Research Advisory Committee (ERTRAC) develops a common vision for European transport. It also coordinates the implementation of the results found by the research in order to improve competitiveness.

Completed projects

The CIVITAS CATALIST project has the aim to validate, exploit and disseminate the results of the CIVITAS Initiative and, more importantly, of stimulating new cities in the adoption of sustainable, clean and energy efficient urban transport.

NICHES+ builds further on the NICHES project. Its mission is to promote innovative measures for making urban transport more efficient and sustainable and to move them from their current ‘niche’ position into a mainstream urban transport application.

CIVITAS VANGUARD is a 54-month grant-based project of the European Commission’s. It is a support action for the coordination and dissemination of CIVITAS Plus, the current phase of the CIVITAS Initiative, and as such serves the CIVITAS Plus collaborative projects (CPs) and the CIVITAS Initiative itself.

CONDUITS developed key performance indicators to assist European municipalities in taking decisions on ITS deployment and to facilitate the exchange of good ITS practice among cities. The project performed a review of ITS in cities today, identified the ITS of tomorrow from a city perspective and reviewed technological developments.

CONDUITS continues for one year beyond its project life from mid 2011 to mid 2012.

BESTFACT (Best Practice Factory for Freight Transport) will develop, disseminate and enhance the utilisation of Best Practices and innovation in freight transport within three thematic clusters: Urban Freight, Green logistics & co-modality, and eFreight. The project will present new descriptions of European Best Practice cases, detailed Best Practice surveys, analyses of innovative policy schemes and will support the implementation of Best Practice actions. Within its thematic workshops and Conferences, BESTFACT will bring stakeholders together creating synergies within different European initiatives.

VRUITS helps to improve safety and mobility of vulnerable road users (VRUs) through ITS applications. The project takes a VRU-centric approach to come to recommendations for suitable ITS applications, leading ot a full integration of the VRUs in the traffic system.

CIVITAS CAPITAL. A three year project aiming to contribute significantly to the goals of the EU's Transport White Paper by capitalising systematically on the results of CIVITAS and creating an effective "value chain" for urban mobility innovation. CAPITAL will initiate and support a mainstreaming process of CIVITIAS principles based on a strengthened community of stakeholders.

Social and Economic Challenges of Transport

Ongoing projects

BuyZET aims to understand and optimise the impact of public procurement activities on transport patterns in cities – and to find innovative and sustainable delivery solutions for goods and services. The BuyZET project is a partnership of cities aiming to achieve zero emission urban delivery of goods and services, by understanding the transportation footprint of procurement activities and developing innovative procurement plans.

The SUNRISE project (Sustainable Urban Neighbourhoods – Research and Implementation Support in Europe) aims at developing new tools to facilitate collaborative ways to address mobility challenges at the neighbourhood level. Six action neighbourhoods will be equipped and empowered to broaden the range of options for the inhabitants, beyond conventional mobility and transport solutions.

CIVITAS SUMPs-Up is an EU-funded project that helps cities introduce cleaner, sustainable mobility solutions. Its focus is to help cities that experience negative effects of transport to develop Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) – strategic long-term planning documents that integrate all transport modes and contribute to balanced environmental, social and economic urban development.

ZeEUS, the Zero Emission Urban Bus System, aims to be the main EU activity to extend the fully-electric solution to the core part of the urban bus network. It fits within the context of the European Commission’s objective to create a competitive and sustainable transport system. To achieve its mission, ZeEUS is testing innovative electric bus technologies with different charging infrastructure solutions in ten demonstration sites across Europe.

ELIPTIC aims to develop new concepts and business cases in order to optimise existing electric public transport infrastructure and rolling stock, saving both money and energy. The project strengthens the role of electric public transport, leading to reduced fossil fuel consumption and improved air quality.

NOVELOG (New cooperative business models and guidance for sustainable city logistics) aims to enable the knowledge and understanding of freight distribution and service trips, by providing guidance for implementing effective and sustainable policies and measures, and to formulate detailed business plans of Urban Freight Transport measures, in a multi-stakeholder partnership. NOVELOG will reach out to all the key players, both public and private, to ensure a stakeholder-oriented and coordinated approach to city logistics.

CITYLAB aims to improve the understanding of the impacts freight and service trips have in our urban areas. Innovative urban freight management solutions are being tested and evaluated in Amsterdam, Brussels, London, Oslo, Paris, Rome and Southampton, with a view to positively influencing business profitability and contributing to increased efficiency and sustainability. The core of CITYLAB is to use cities as ‘living laboratories’ - dynamic, real-world test environments where different public and private freight transport measures can be evaluated, adapted and improved in a cyclical way.

The Strengthening European Transport Research and Innovation Strategies project (SETRIS) is a project funded under the European Union (EU)’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation Programme, specifically targeted at strengthening the research and innovation strategies of the transport industries in Europe. SETRIS assists the 5 European Technological Platforms (ETPs) to define their common research steps for strategy and programmes in alignment.

Polis manages the Sustainable Urban Mobility activities within the EIP-SCC Market Place. The European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities (EIP-SCC) is an initiative supported by the European Commission bringing together cities, industry, SMEs, banks, research and other smart city actors. The EIP-SCC Market Place has been designed for those who are active in the challenging area of Smart Cities and willing to know more about ongoing and foreseen activities throughout Europe. The Market Place includes two Sustainable Urban Mobility Initiatives: Smart Mobility Services and EV4SCC looking into electromobility.

The European Bus System of the Future 2 (EBSF_2) project capitalizes on the results of the previous EBSF project. As the former, EBSF_2 is aimed at developing a new generation of urban bus systems by means of new vehicle technologies and infrastructures in combination with operational best practices, and testing them in operating scenarios within several European bus networks. The distinctive factor of EBSF_2 is the consortium’s ambition to improve the image of the bus through solutions for increased efficiency of the system...

In ENDURANCE 30 project partners will build up 25 national networks and an overarching European network organisation on Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs). The network is built on the existing structures of EPOMM, such as website, workshops, networking tools, policy exchange support and its e-update. ENDURANCE will address 250 cities, offer training, raise awareness and foster exchange. The project is called ENDURANCE as it aims to build an enduring network structure that will last well beyond the end of the project.

The European Road Transport Research Advisory Committee (ERTRAC) develops a common vision for European transport. It also coordinates the implementation of the results found by the research in order to improve competitiveness.

Completed projects

The CIVITAS CATALIST project has the aim to validate, exploit and disseminate the results of the CIVITAS Initiative and, more importantly, of stimulating new cities in the adoption of sustainable, clean and energy efficient urban transport.

NICHES+ builds further on the NICHES project. Its mission is to promote innovative measures for making urban transport more efficient and sustainable and to move them from their current ‘niche’ position into a mainstream urban transport application.

CIVITAS VANGUARD is a 54-month grant-based project of the European Commission’s. It is a support action for the coordination and dissemination of CIVITAS Plus, the current phase of the CIVITAS Initiative, and as such serves the CIVITAS Plus collaborative projects (CPs) and the CIVITAS Initiative itself.

CONDUITS developed key performance indicators to assist European municipalities in taking decisions on ITS deployment and to facilitate the exchange of good ITS practice among cities. The project performed a review of ITS in cities today, identified the ITS of tomorrow from a city perspective and reviewed technological developments.

CONDUITS continues for one year beyond its project life from mid 2011 to mid 2012.

ELTIS+ supports the creation of urban transport systems with less energy consumption and fewer emissions. ELTIS features a web portal which aims to be an urban mobility observatory by facilitating the exchange of information and good practice in the field of urban mobility in Europe. It provides hundreds of case studies, daily news updates, EU funding information updates on EU legislation and case studies and a free image library. Also part of the ELTIS+ initiative is SUMP, a range of promotion and training activities to promote the uptake of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans across Europe. Also visit www.mobilityplans.eu.

ENERQI implements an innovative quality monitoring system for public transport. It involves voluntary quality scouts which are in fact public transport travellers that answer questionnaires on a wide range of quality related issues regarding the line that they are using.

P3ITS explores the efficient procurement of innovation to support ITS and establish a network of experts.

SUGAR promotes the exchange, discussion and transfer of policy experience, knowledge and good practices through policy and planning in the field of urban freight management, between and among good practice and transfer sites.

ASK-IT develops new technologies which are able to provide personalised and geo-localised information to people with reduced mobility. It aims at facilitating their accessibility to different urban services (transport, tourism, etc.).

The « Co-ordination of Urban RoAd-user ChArging Organisational issues » project examines the implementation of tolls for road users as a way to manage urban areas. It coordinates researches and good practices made by cities using or thinking of using this system.

PLUME was a Thematic Network within the Land Use and Transportation Research cluster of the City of Tomorrow key action funded by DG Research of the European Commission. It sought to facilitate the transfer of innovation in the field of planning and urban mobility from the research community to end users in order to improve urban quality of life.

UNI-ACCESS project creates a platform to coordinate research on public transport accessibility. The goal is to offer everyone the access to quality transports.

Voyager aimed at creating a European platform for local and regional public transport stakeholders (PT operators, suppliers, authorities at all levels, researchers and users) to present their views, give input on current and planned actions and ultimately provide recommendations to improve the European, national and local public transport environment to a level that fully meets the transport user's requirements.

QUEST develops an audit tool that evaluates a city's urban mobility policies. The aim of the QUEST audit is to support cities in their efforts of developing more sustainable urban mobility systems. More than 50 cities from all over Europe are involved in QUEST, demonstrating that there is much demand for advice on urban mobility planning. QUEST is co-funded by the European Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation, under the STEER programme. The project has started in May 2011 and will finish in October 2013.

The EC's Sustainable Urban Mobility campaign is a three-year initiative aiming to support sustainable urban mobility campaigners in 31 countries. An award fund supports actions at the local, regional and/or national, or even EU level. The campaign includes an award scheme for European cities based on their sustainable urban mobility plans (SUMPs).

EPTA stands for Enhancing Public Transport Authorities in Europe. Across the EU, local authorities are organising themselves to better answer to the new regulatory framework in which to operate public transport. The EPTA project has been designed to study the local institutional context, focusing on Public Transport Authorities or Public Transport executive agencies.

BESTFACT (Best Practice Factory for Freight Transport) will develop, disseminate and enhance the utilisation of Best Practices and innovation in freight transport within three thematic clusters: Urban Freight, Green logistics & co-modality, and eFreight. The project will present new descriptions of European Best Practice cases, detailed Best Practice surveys, analyses of innovative policy schemes and will support the implementation of Best Practice actions. Within its thematic workshops and Conferences, BESTFACT will bring stakeholders together creating synergies within different European initiatives.

CH4LLENGE – The goal of CH4LLENGE is to actively facilitate the take-up of Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) in European cities, and to establish a cross- initiative dialogue on overcoming SUMP challenges. The project will support 30 European cities at different stages of working with SUMP. The CH4LLENGE consortium will develop “challenge kits” and will set-up an e-learning platform. More information about CH4LLENGE will soon be available at the project’s webpage.

SOLUTIONS aims to support the exchange on innovative and green urban mobility solutions between cities from Europe, Asia, Latin America and the Mediterranean. The project brings together a wealth of experience and technical knowledge from international organisations, consultants, cities, and experts involved in transport issues and solutions.

3iBS was a 7FP CSA aiming at stimulating coordinated research on urban Bus Systems, developing an exploitation platform & strategies for innovations supporting bus stakeholders, promoting exchanges of knowledge between worldwide experts and dissemination about and capitalisation on results and solutions of successful Bus Systems' projects.

CIVITAS CAPITAL. A three year project aiming to contribute significantly to the goals of the EU's Transport White Paper by capitalising systematically on the results of CIVITAS and creating an effective "value chain" for urban mobility innovation. CAPITAL will initiate and support a mainstreaming process of CIVITIAS principles based on a strengthened community of stakeholders.